Fresca, For All It Be

Sam here. I apologize about being off so long. In order to make up for the absence, I’m going to discuss my feelings on Fresca.

It’s pretty good.

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In all seriousness, Fresca is something of a blank space in the history of sodas. It definitely exists and was even popular at one point, evidenced by the amount of 70’s and 80’s commercials for it. Fresca can be easily purchased at any local Wal-Mart, Safeway, Target, at least where I live. Yet despite the easy availability, I know very few people who have actually heard about it, let alone tried the damn thing. One has to wonder – why the lack of popularity in America come 2015?

It might be attributed to the basic idea of Fresca. Fresca was launched as a grapefruit-flavored soda; although it comes in other flavors now, that’s what it’s best known for. When one thinks of “grapefruit”, they generally don’t associate it with “soda”, and therein lies the problem. While there are a variety of lemon-lime drinks and carbonated soft drinks in the world, grapefruit soda is an interesting idea at best, but not something you could see putting your money into at first glance. Not to mention grapefruit is incredibly bitter as a standalone fruit, which us lightweight Americans hate (but Europe eats that shit right up, go figure). There’s a lot of competition for soft drinks in the US, especially artificially-sweetened ones, and grapefruit isn’t exactly a popular choice. Squirt suffered from the same problems, ditto for Tab.

And speaking of Tab, despite the ever-rising demand for diet sodas, Fresca and Tab (which are inherently diet) seem to be dwarfed by Diet Coke, Diet Pepsi (which are just artificially flavored Coke and Pepsi ripoffs). This always stymies me. The artificial sweeteners in Diet Coke are absolutely repugnant to me; it leaves quite the aftertaste. Fresca’s sweeteners, however, are actually sweet. It is the only diet soda I can actually tolerate because it was made to be a calorie-free diet soda from the get-go, which gave it a genuine, non-filtered taste. Yet Diet Coke and Diet Pepsi sell more (which is retroactively ironic, considering Fresca is a Coca-Cola product to begin with).

Perhaps I’m being too limited in my modern-day urban whiteness. I hear tell that Fresca has garnered lasting popularity in Mexico (Mexican Fresca is, btw, fucking delicious, despite not being calorie-free) and Europe; former President Lyndon B. Johnson was a fan of Fresca and apparently had a Fresca fountain installed in the White House; it’s apparently popular as a mixer in vodka, gin, tequila. And despite having virtually no reputation good or ill outside of hardcore soda buffs (like me), it still has quite the loyal fanbase. If you want to check one out, do so – try finding the Latino version if at all possible. Fresca is a very sweet, refreshing drink, leaving only the mildest of aftertastes. And even if you don’t like the grapefruit taste, there’s plenty of other types to check out, such as Peach, Black Cherry, Cherry Citrus (my second favorite).

Til next time.